Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
Observations all along the line - Kimball & the Southern Panhandle First
Kimball Athletes Back On Track After 2020 Hiatus
On a beautiful Monday afternoon this week, the Kimball boys golf team began practice. After missing his junior year of golf due to the pandemic, Cole Henton and the rest of the golf team began by hitting balls at the Four Winds Golf Course junior practice area.
Here comes the Kimball spring sports season – a year after COVID-19 wiped out the track and golf seasons and two years since the last competitions.
"After taking last year off, all schools will have a lot of work to do to make up for lost time so we will all be on an equal playing field," Longhorns activities director Ken Smith told the Observer.
For Kimball, March 20 is go time. That's when the boys and girls track teams open their seasons at the Chadron State indoor meet.
About 25 student-athletes are going out for varsity track, Smith said,
The Longhorn boys golf team, meanwhile, tees off April 11 at Mitchell. Smith expects the squad will field five or six golfers.
Then there's junior high track.
"The junior high has not had a meeting yet," Smith said on March 4, "but we have had good roster numbers there over the past. At the junior high level, it will be like having all seventh-graders participating since the eighth-grade lost their seventh-grade season last spring."
As for spring team schedules, they're pretty similar to those on the Kimball Longhorns 2020-21 pocket schedule that came out last fall.
In fact, the golf schedule remains unchanged. The varsity and junior high track schedules each have minor changes but no cancellations. And that's it.
You can see the latest updated Longhorns spring schedules at the bottom of this article.
Dates to mark on your calendar include March 20 for the Kimball Invite varsity track meet, April 14 for junior high track (Potter-Dix) at Kimball, April 22 for junior high track at Kimball, and May 6 for boys golf at Four Winds Golf Course.
Kimball will be following NSAA spring sports guidelines for the virus, which are posted online at the Kimball Public Schools website.
"Boys golf is just like girls golf was in the fall (with NSAA guidelines)," Smith said. "Track is close to what football was. With these being outdoor sports, that helps."
Coming March 25: the Observer's annual Spring Sports Special for Kimball, Potter-Dix and Banner County teams.
2021 Kimball
Spring Sports Schedules
Varsity Track
March 20 – Chadron State Indoor, 9 a.m.
March 27 – Kimball Invite, 9 a.m.
April 1 – Bayard, 9 a.m.
April 6 – Creek Valley, 9 a.m. (Changed from April 5)
April 10 – Bayard BCD, 8:30 a.m. (Changed from May 7)
April 17 – Morrill WTC, TBA
April 24 – Morrill George Calvert, 9 a.m.
April 27 – Scottsbluff (Best of the West), 4 p.m.
April 30 – Hershey SPVA, 11 a.m.
May 11 – District, TBA
May 21-22 – State (Omaha), TBA
Junior High Track
April 12 – Bayard, 9 a.m. (Changed from April 11)
April 14 – Kimball (Potter-Dix), 9 a.m.
April 22 – Kimball, 9 a.m.
April 30 – Burns, 9 a.m. (Moved from Pine Bluffs)
May 6 – Hershey SPVA, 9 a.m. (Moved from Chase County)
Boys Golf
April 11 – Mitchell, 9 a.m.
April 15 – Bridgeport, 9 a.m.
April 17 – Chase County, 9 a.m.
April 20 – Morrill, 9 a.m.
April 26 – Scottsbluff, 9 a.m.
April 30 – Bridgeport SPVA, 9 a.m.
May 1 – Bridgeport WTC, 9 a.m.
May 6 – Kimball, 9 a.m.
May 11 – Bayard, 9 a.m.
Week of May 17 – District, TBA
May 26-27 – State, TBA
